


God Damned Redemption

by Desired_Misery



Series: Sinners finding Salvation [1]
Category: Red Dead Redemption (Video Games)
Genre: Afterlife, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst with a Happy Ending, Gen, High Honor Arthur Morgan, Second Chances, Spirits, Temporary Character Death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-15
Updated: 2020-12-15
Packaged: 2021-03-10 23:20:22
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,173
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28085331
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Desired_Misery/pseuds/Desired_Misery
Summary: "I’m a stubborn son of a bitch" -- Arthur Morgan, to the spirit meant to take him to the afterlife.After all his life, Arthur Morgan's buck should have expected this.
Series: Sinners finding Salvation [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2057520
Comments: 2
Kudos: 47





	God Damned Redemption

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Out of the Dark](https://archiveofourown.org/works/17565032) by [sky_daybreak](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sky_daybreak/pseuds/sky_daybreak). 



Dying on cold rock, blood and breath leaving his body in equal measure, hissing out of damaged tissues and organs. The pain, the fear, that’s nothing new. He’s almost died many times before— accepted it many times before this only for violence or sheer damn luck snatched him back. 

Regret.

It weighs on him more than his weakened body wracked with injuries and disease. Dyin’ from consumption, that he had made his peace with. Enough as anyone could. The strength he wishes for is not to force his lungs full of air. Nor is it to get off this mountain peak he’ll die on.

Even before the disease, he wasn’t strong enough. Never was.

The sky lightens, blue turning orange and peach, glittering pink and gold seeping through the horizon. A borrowed breath shudders in his throat. He’s heard enough of them to recognize his own death rattle. The pain don’t matter no more; he ain’t had enough oxygen to keep himself tied to the ground. He cannot feel his heartbeat flutter against his battered ribs.

If only he had been stronger…

His buck, a sixteen-point whitetail lifts its head from a golden-covered field. A beautiful sight overlaid with the quiet mountainous morning. A final sigh falls from his bloody mouth. Sour with regret.

_ I did what I could. Ought to have fought harder for ‘em, I know now...  _

A velvet nose brushes his cheek. Large black like liquid night stare into fading bloodshot eyes.

_ God, I wish I had done more. Please… let it be enough. _

Arthur watches the mountains disappear as dawn blankets the land in light. A dark spot emerges from the fading shadows, a coyote with a coat darker than sin limps over. Settles in his lap with a content sigh, fading faster than him. Like steam off a lake, it melts in the sun.

_ Is your peace not earned? Rest after all those years? _

The buck is standing before him, the rising sun framed and captured by its impressive antlers. Steam billows from its nose as an ethereal, uncanny voice that he cannot place echoes across the lands in a whisper.

Arthur ain’t in his body anymore. Somewhere just above, tethered above his blood-matted hair. He’s got nothing to use to speak or look but he does somehow.

_ No rest for the wicked _ . Arthur cannot laugh, bitter and biting. He wants to.

A vulture Arthur missed swoops low, cutting a shadow across Arthur’s still body.

_ You’ve earned eternal rest. All do. _

Arthur looks for the others, the losses that both tore his heart to pieces and weighed it down more than all the lead in the world.

_ I ain’t gonna rest. Never did, never will. _

The whitetail snorts, lifting its head up to eye the vulture circling close.

_ Wicked or not, Arthur Morgan, you are a stubborn soul. _

This time, Arthur imagines the coarse, weak laugh in his straining lungs. If this is God, Arthur’s stubborn streak should be an old friend. The morning burns red and warm on cold skin.

_ Would you do it again?  _

The buck turns its head to pin Arthur in place with one piercing eye.

_ Yes— no! I’d do it until it went right.  _ Arthur tries to move, tries to bring conviction into his lungs without a working heart.  _ If I could go back… I’d… I’d take those blinders off my fool head. See the path we were slipping down before we hit the bottom. _

_ Too many died. By my hand, by my misguided loyalty… I regret so much of it. _

The vulture perches on a ledge, large wings stretching out to catch the sun. Cutting out the light.

_ Not all?  _ The buck takes a step towards the scavenger, shaking its head at it. The vulture doesn’t shy away.

_ I was blinded by blood until it was my own I was coughing up. Too late to change much.  _ Arthur wishes for the sun back, wants the damn bird to wait its turn until he’s done and dead for good. After this conversation is with whatever power is before him.

_ Late, not too late.  _ The buck lowers his head at the vulture. The bird tucks in its wings some.

_ I cannot take away your pain. _

_ Deserved it. _ Arthur agrees.

With a jerk of the buck’s head, the vulture launches off the rock with a shrieking cry. As it leaves, Arthur sees the bloom of red coating its front like a familiar red vest.

_ What a soul does with a life is not up to us. _ The buck lowers its head to stare into Arthur’s eyes. His body’s eyes. Where he finds himself again, surrounded by the cold weight of an unresponsive body.  _ It is up to you. _

_ Will you try again? _

Arthur can hardly see the buck in the sunlight, its outline blurred by a new day. He wants to lift a hand and feel the warmth of the morning on the animal’s thick fur.

_ I’m a stubborn son of a bitch. _

A puff of breath hits his cold cheek. The buck stands over him, straddling his slumped and weary corpse, and lowers its head until its forehead is pressed against Arthur’s, its antlers on either side of his face, each tine outlined in gold.

_ There will be peace waiting for you at every end. Always. _ Soft understanding eyes blink at him, even breaths hitting his face. 

If a dead man could feel emotion, Arthur would dare to call this hope.

_ As many years as it takes?  _

Another snort. This time, Arthur swears it stems from amusement.

_ Until the sun burns out and this earth falls cold, Arthur Morgan. If that is long enough. _

If only his slack mouth could twitch into one of his rueful smiles.

_ If I am strong enough… _

The buck bumps his head, gentle.  _ One day you will be. Not this life. Another. _

_ I don’t want to be the one casting shadows, not again. Don’t let me… _

He would have thought the pain of regret would have died with him. 

_ Then earn your rest, Arthur Morgan. I will follow you to all ends, until you’re at peace. _

The buck pushes— not on his forehead. There is nothing solid there to resist. Arthur Morgan is floating and falling all at once, past rock and earth and through the days backward, waiting for the landing…

Between the pain and fever, Arthur isn’t sure what he dreams of. It swims in the back of his mind with his headache and the blood dripping out of his shoulder and mouth. It seeps into his broken bones, past the labored beating of his heart to somewhere deeper.

He ain’t dying yet. Even if that bastard Colm let him.

The simmering burn in his soul isn’t ready to dim yet.

  
  
  


Arthur escapes on his own, limping and fighting to his horse, heading across the land back to camp. Hardly able to do more than hold onto the saddle and watch an impressive buck with sun crowning its head keep his mare company a dozen strides ahead.

**Author's Note:**

> I got so many feels and i'm projecting them onto Arthur here.
> 
> aka: 2020 sucks and goddamn, I just want a fictional character I care about to be happy. so i got another series stuck in my cursed head


End file.
